Reporting the financial crisis - where did we go wrong?

An opinion survey has, somewhat unsurprisingly, discovered that the British people are both confused and worried by the financial crisis.

Similarly, there's no surprise in them blaming bankers and politicians for the the crisis. More significant, however, is that many of them think journalists have failed to inform them properly.

That is one of the key findings of the survey carried out by ICM on behalf of a research project, Media and the economic crisis, led by Steve Schifferes, professor of financial journalism at City University London.

Schifferes also organised a two-day symposium at City this week, Soothsayers of doom? The media and the financial crisis in comparative and historical perspective.

It attracted a host of excellent speakers - such as Financial Times editor Lionel Barber, FT historian David Kynaston and the BBC's chief economics correspondent Hugh Pym - to discuss where we, the media, went wrong.

I was particularly struck by the contribution from William Keegan, the hugely experienced economics commentator for The Observer.

He explained how financial and business journalism has developed from the 1970s onwards, highlighting the important role of the middle-market newspapers, particularly the pioneering work by the Daily Mail's Patrick Sergeant.

He made the subject much less esoteric, and therefore much more accessible, to a wider range of readers. Now endless pages are devoted to the world of finance.

That is not to say that the origins of the current crisis were well covered. Too few financial journalists had the knowledge to get to grips with the credit markets, for example.

That's why commentators such as Keegan remain indispensable, helping readers to understand a very complex subject through their regular columns. Come to think of it, I don't think Keegan's column is regular enough!